Casting Light on Iranian Deserts

Closely watched by their guides and military escort, harried biologists survey the wild things that survive there

As herpetologists Ted Papenfuss and Bob Macey circle desert brush
in which they have cornered a lizard, they are watched diligently
by a man in military green hefting a machine gun. The scientists
are part of the first team of American biologists sanctioned to do
research in Iran in two decades. During a six-week expedition in
the deserts of southeastern Iran, the scientists are escorted under
very tight security and at times conduct their studies in the
vicinity of drug-smuggling kidnappers or the fractious Afghan
border. On the American team is a young woman who has to abide by
the Muslim dress code of concealing attire, regardless of the
oppressive heat or the constraints the garments pose in field
collecting.

Despite
these hassles, the Americans, from the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology
at the University of California at Berkeley, and Washington
University in St. Louis, work amicably alongside Iranian scientists
and students, exchanging information and collecting numerous
specimens, including sun spiders, geckos and rodents.

Traveling in a large entourage of scientists and security, as
well as assistants to arrange food and shelter, makes it difficult
to meet ordinary Iranian citizens, but when such encounters occur,
our writer, who is the entomologist on the trip, reports that the
Americans are met with great kindness and an open curiosity about
the United States.

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